Workshop on macroscopic superpositions of levitated systems – Workshop on macroscopic superpositions of levitated systems

Workshop on
Macroscopic Superpositions of Levitated Systems

22-26 September 2025

Welcome to the webpage for the Workshop on Macroscopic Superpositions of Levitated Systems to be held at the Centre for Quantum Technologies at the National University of Singapore.

The workshop concerns both the theoretical and experimental aspects of this subject. This workshop aims to build connections between young scientists and promotes open discussions between participants. As such, 30-minute talks by all participants will be held at the beginning of the week, leaving two full days open for discussions on the presented work (and beyond). Please note that participation in this workshop is by invitation only.

The Institute of Physics Singapore will be holding its annual meeting in the same period, over 24-26 September. We are exploring the possibility of joint sessions, and attendees of this event will have the flexibility to attend talks at that meeting too. See the IPS Meeting 2025 website.

Invited speakers

Andreu Riera-Campeny – Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information, Austria

Theoretical physicist interested in exploring tests of quantum mechanics in macroscopic systems. Building on expertise in nonequilibrium open quantum systems, his current research focuses on designing, modeling, and optimizing proposals to prepare macroscopic quantum superpositions with levitated particles. This includes studying their nonlinear quantum dynamics, decoherence mechanisms, and strategies for certifying quantum behavior at large scales. Ultimately, his work aims to bridge theory and experiment in the quest to test the boundaries of quantum mechanics and its applicability to macroscopic systems.

Andrew Dana – Northwestern University, United States

Anupam Mazumdar – University of Groningen, Netherlands

Daniel Kodroff – Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, United States

My research interests are in how optically levitated and optomechanical systems can be used to study fundamental questions in particle physics. I would like to talk about ongoing R&D work occurring at LBL related to studying sterile neutrinos and weak decays usnd radio-isotopes doped in levitated sensors. This is based on work described in PRX Quantum 4, 010315 and Phys. Rev. Lett. 133, 023602. We are calling this the Quantum Invisible Particle Search or QuIPS experiment.

Dennis Uitenbroek – Leiden University, Netherlands

Eli van der Bent – Leiden University, Netherlands

Huaijin Zhang – Beijing Institute of Technology, China

Jakub Wardak – University of Southampton, United Kingdom

Kim Daehee – Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, Japan

My affiliation is the Quantum Machines Unit at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) in Okinawa, Japan. OIST is a graduate-only, fully English-speaking university established by the Japanese government in 2011. It operates without traditional academic departments; instead, research is organized into interdisciplinary Units, each led by a faculty member. These Units span a broad range of topics across science and technology, fostering collaboration across disciplines. I am a PhD student from Korea, currently in the fourth year of a five-year doctoral program. My research involves simulations and experiments focusing on the magnetic levitation of objects and the study of their rotational dynamics. While such levitated rotors have potential applications in precision sensing—such as gyroscopes—our primary goal is to develop systems with ultra-low rotational damping and to achieve precise control over their motion, ultimately pushing them toward the quantum regime.

Lorenzo Braccini – University College London, United Kingdom

Marko Toros – University of Ljubljana, Slovenia

After completing a PhD at the University of Groningen on gravity-induced entanglement experiments, I started a postdoc at the National University of Singapore in January this year to continue my work on coherence loss in macroscopic quantum systems and quantum information and start research on creating quantum superpositions in macroscopic objects.

Martine Schut – National University of Singapore

Matteo Fadel – ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Panyu Hou – Tsinghua University, China

Assistant professor at Center for Quantum Information, Tsinghua University. I am an experimentalist, working with trapped ion for large-scale quantum computing and quantum simulation, as well as nitrogen-vacancy centers for quantum network and quantum sensing.

Qiongyuan Wu – King’s College London, United Kingdom

Stefan Nimmrichter – University of Siegen, Germany

Yin Peiran – Nanjing University, China

Dr. Peiran Yin earned his Ph.D. in 2020 from the CAS Key Laboratory of Microscale Magnetic Resonance at the University of Science and Technology of China, under the supervision of Professor Jiangfeng Du. Currently, he serves as an Associate Researcher at Nanjing University in Professor Huang Pu’s laboratory. His research focuses on developing experimental techniques with magnetically levitated systems for fundamental physics investigations, including tests of beyond-standard-model forces, high-precision gravity measurements, and ground-state cooling.

The main subject of the workshop is the creation of macroscopic superpositions in levitated systems, which includes, for example, topics such as cooling techniques, mechanical resonators, levitation, trapping, coherence loss and optomechanics with nanospheres.

Schedule

22-26 September

Monday - Wednesday

Short talks - details to be announced closer to the event

Thursday - Friday

Unstructured discussion time for participants

Schedule

Day 1 – Sep 22
Day 2 – Sep 23
Day 3 – Sep 24
Day 4 – Sep 25
Day 5 – Sep 26

9:00 – 9:30 Opening
9:30 – 10:45 Speaker 1-2 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
10:45 – 11:15 Break
11:15 – 12:30 Speaker 3-4 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
12:30 – 14:00 Lunch
14:00 – 15:15 Speaker 5-6 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
15:15 – 15:45 Break
15:45 – 17:00 Speaker 7-8 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)

9:00 – 10:15 Speaker 9-10 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
10:15 – 10:45 Break
10:45 – 12:00 Speaker 11-12 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
12:00 – 13:30 Lunch
13:30 – 14:45 Speaker 13-14 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
14:45 – 15:15 Break
15:15 – 16:30 Speaker 15-16 (2×30 mins + 15 mins questions)
17:30 – 19:30 Excursion: walk the Rail Corridor
19:30 Dinner

9:00 – 12:00 Discussions
12:00 – 13:30 Lunch
13:30 – 16:30 TBD

9:00 – 12:00 Discussions
12:00 – 13:30 Lunch
13:30 – 16:00 Discussions

9:00 – 12:00 Discussions
12:00 – 13:30 Lunch
13:30 – 16:00 Discussions

Location

Centre for Quantum Technologies National University of Singapore Block S15, 3 Science Drive 2, Singapore 117543

Contact

This workshop is organised by Valerio Scarani and Martine Schut at the Centre for Quantum Technologies (CQT) at the National University of Singapore. The talks will be held at CQT. If you have any questions, please contact Martine at m.schut@nus.edu.sg.